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Month: September 2016

“Call forth the troops of the heavenly realm. The Lord Almighty has spoken. His wrath will be poured out across the land. The rocks shall cry out and blood shall be spilled as the rivers splash down the crevices of mountain sides.

Lift up your prayers for the nations to repent for judgment shall fall quick and concise. The sins of the people shall bring forth judgment as never before.

Pray peace and justice for all who hear, for their eternal life shall be forfeited in their paths of sin and retribution shall hail the wicked from the most high places.

Land shall flow with the blood of victory over and above the sands, hills, and valleys of your decrepit ways. Repent O’ children of God for your sins shall also hinder you in bringing forth the truth of your living God. Search your hearts for there you will find…

It is sadistic to use the public school system, which holds a captive audience, to engage in a social gender identity experiment with the nation’s young people.

Socially indoctrinating young children toward accepting transgenderism is rampant today in public schools. In Washington state, public schools will begin teaching gender expression to kindergarteners in fall 2017, under newly approved health education learning standards. The gay advocacy network GLSEN received a grant from the federal Centers for Disease Control in 2011 for $1.425 million over five years to promote the LGBT agenda in public schools at taxpayers’ expense.

The problem with taking the steps to transition physically—cross-gender hormones and surgeries—is that physical changes are likely permanent, but the feelings driving the desire may change, especially for young people. I recently received an email from a man now in his thirties that demonstrates this reality:

I transitioned to female beginning in my late teens and changed my name in my early 20s, over ten years ago. But it wasn’t right for me; I feel only discontent now in the female role. I was told that my transgender feelings were permanent, immutable, physically deep-seated in my brain and could NEVER change, and that the only way I would ever find peace was to become female. The problem is, I don’t have those feelings anymore.

When I began seeing a psychologist a few years ago to help overcome some childhood trauma issues, my depression and anxiety began to wane but so did my transgender feelings. So two years ago I began contemplating going back to my birth gender, and it feels right to do so. I have no doubts—I want to be male!

Feelings can change. For this man, feelings that were overwhelming in his teens changed after he went to counseling to deal with childhood trauma.

My story is similar. Changing my gender was an empty promise, a temporary reprieve that didn’t fix anything. After much psychological counseling, I came to see that my dream of becoming a girl had simply been an escape to cope with deep pain from childhood events. Unfortunately, the so-called earlier treatment of cross-gender hormones and surgery was destructive for my family, marriage, and career, and nearly caused me to take my own life.

Ignoring Science to Push a Political Agenda

Now children in Washington state will be taught starting in kindergarten about the normalcy of wanting to be the other sex. Public schools should not be the breeding ground for any sexual activism by any group at any time. The public school system is holding kids hostage as activists groom the next generation of transgender activists, despite serious harm this poses to children.

For example, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools in North Carolina has eliminated the use of the terms “boys” and “girls,” requiring that teachers call their pupils sex-neutered terms such as “students” or “scholars.” They also require educators to keep parents in the dark about their child’s request for a different name or pronoun.

The activists who push this agenda in public school studies ignore the science regarding innate sex. An August 2016 review of the scientific literature finds no definitive evidence in research to suggest that transgender people are born that way. This 143-page report from two distinguished doctors from Johns Hopkins University finds there is not enough definitive scientific evidence to suggest gay, lesbian, and transgender people are born as such. More importantly, they affirmed that innate biological sex is fixed and unchangeable. Only gender persona—appearance and behavior—can be changed.

I was a kid who started cross-dressing with my grandmother at the age of four. I can tell you from first-hand knowledge that cross-dressing is a psychological indoctrination. It is sadistic to use the public school system, which holds a captive audience, to engage in a social gender identity experiment with the nation’s young people.

Medical Experimentation Can Devastate People

We have known changing genders leads to suicides from reports in the late 1970s that provide a telltale glimpse into the consequences of ignoring the science. Endocrinologist Dr. Charles Ihlenfeld warned about the suicides and unhappiness of transgender clients based on his experience treating more than 500 transgender patients with hormones over a six-year period at colleague Dr. Harry Benjamin’s gender clinic.

Ihlenfeld observed that the gender change led to poor outcomes, and concluded that 80 percent of the patients who want to change their physical appearance this way shouldn’t do it. Ihlenfeld blew the whistle a little louder when he said, “There is too much unhappiness among people who have had the surgery. Too many of them end as suicides.” You wonder why a doctor like this, who was an insider on early gender change experiments, was ignored.

Medicine has a long history of failing to properly and effectively help people who struggle with unusual emotional and psychological issues. Experimenting with surgery as treatment for psychological disorders is not new. My book, “Paper Genders,” gives a 100-year history of these kinds of failures.

This includes psychologist Dr. Henry Cotton. In the early part of the 1900s, Cotton was the head of the main New Jersey state mental hospital in Trenton. He theorized that infections caused mental illness, and was zealous in his effort to cure mental illness by removing the suspected source of infection. He started with removing infected teeth. When that failed, he pulled the remaining teeth and tonsils, then moved on to removing sections of the colon, the stomach, gallbladders, and testicles and ovaries.

Cotton reported a success rate of 85 percent. TheNew York Times lauded Cotton as a scientific genius whose investigations gave “high hope” for the future, and Cotton became famous in the United States and Europe. Desperate people brought their suffering loved ones to the Trenton hospital for the breakthrough treatment. Kept out of public view were the chilling mortality statistics: 30 to 40 percent of his surgical patients died from his so-called treatment.

I find striking similarities between Cotton and the gender-change surgeons of today. The media celebrate those like Caitlyn Jenner who “bravely” change genders. Desperate people who feel they should be the opposite sex seek treatment from sympathetic surgeons, who will cut away male and female body parts, and from endocrinologists, who will inject cross-gender hormones. It sounds barbaric and crazy—and it is.

From Body Chopping to Brain Blending

The surgical insanity did not end with Cotton. Starting in the mid-1930s, neurologist Dr. Walter Freeman partnered with Dr. Watts, a neurosurgeon, to perform lobotomies as treatment for mental disorders. Freeman believed cutting certain nerves in the brain could eliminate excess emotion and stabilize a personality.

The first lobotomies involved drilling holes in the skull and inserting a rotating knife to destroy brain cells in the prefrontal lobes of the brain. Later, Freeman developed a 10-minute trans-orbital lobotomy in which the brain was accessed through the eye sockets with an instrument that resembled an ice pick. Freeman’s procedure did not require a surgeon or an operating room, which allowed Freeman, who was not a surgeon, to perform the lobotomies. Freeman performed more than 2,500 lobotomies in his lifetime.

Results for patients varied. In “The Lobotomy Files: One Doctor’s Legacy,” the Wall Street Journal says: “Drs. Freeman and Watts considered about one-third of their operations successes in which the patient was able to lead a ‘productive life,’ Dr. Freeman’s son says. Another third were able to return home but not support themselves. The final third were ‘failures,’ according to Dr. Watts.”

During their heyday, both doctors were held in high esteem, but the long-term negative results for a majority of their patients were another regrettable outcome in the history of using surgery to treat mental illness.

Surgery Doesn’t Treat Transgenderism

Cotton, Freeman, and Watts were precursors to today’s treatment of transgenderism, a mental disorder, with another set of surgeries. They treated patients by pulling teeth, cutting out colons, and scrambling brain tissue, resulting in mortality rates of 30 to 40 percent and a failure rate of 33 percent, respectively. The treatment methods in hindsight seem barbaric.

The compassionate response is to explore other less extreme options first, before resorting to surgery.

Today’s accepted treatment for gender issues—cutting off body parts and rearranging everything from the Adam’s apple, hips, and breasts to the genitalia—seems barbaric as well, and lacking in compassion. The compassionate response is to explore other less extreme options first, before resorting to surgery.

Our long history with treating transgenderism strongly suggests surgery has not been effective. In my journey to gender change, my psychologist told me surgery was the only answer to my problems, and never asked any questions to discover other possible causes of my gender distress.

Today, people write to me about their gender-change experiences. They consistently share how at the time of their transition they were told gender change was the only treatment for their condition. Parents write to me concerned about their adult children pursuing transition because they know no one is considering that trauma from the person’s childhood could be leading to this unusual desire. Parents report that gender therapists don’t want to know about childhood events. The therapist says if an adult wants transition, he or she can have it.

As with Cotton, Freeman, and Watts, today’s surgical gender-change treatments are not submitted to rigorous scientific study to evaluate their safety, effectiveness over time, and unexpected consequences. Those who regret making the transition, who return to their birth gender, and who are lost to suicide aren’t counted in studies because researchers can’t find them. The statistics are skewed in favor of positive outcomes because the people experiencing negative outcomes are, in scientific language, “lost to follow-up.”

Suicide Threats Indicate Mental Illness

Gender-distressed teens will often say something along the lines of “If I don’t get puberty blockers or hormones and surgery to transition, I’m going to commit suicide.” They mean to demonstrate the strength of their cross-gender feelings and the urgency of their need for transition to everyone who might otherwise urge caution, such as parents, psychotherapists, and endocrinologists.

Threatening suicide is a serious matter that points to the presence of serious mental health issues. When a transgender child uses emotional and psychological blackmail to get fast-tracked towards extreme surgery, it should raise concerns about the person’s emotional and psychological health. A suicide threat points to the urgent need for intervention and psychotherapy, not hormones and surgery.

Consider early life events that unfold like this, from an email I received recently:

Help, my daughter is trying to live as a man and desperately wants gender re-assignment surgery.

Her father was a male to male pedophile. He abused our son. Years later my son became homosexual and is married to a man.

My daughter on the other hand was rejected by her dad. She spent her teen years hating men. She began to engorge herself so that guys would be repulsed by her. She developed obsessive disorders and made sure she looked unattractive to men. She accomplished being unattractive and men turned away from her. She decided to be a lesbian. She decided that wasn’t for her after a bad break-up. Now she wants to become a transgender.

It’s not completely unexpected a young woman like this would seek to become a transgender given the rejection of her father, her appearance calculated to repel men, and a failed lesbian relationship. Her dad’s pedophilia, homosexual leanings, and rejection of her would easily keep her from developing a healthy self-image and relationships.

She sees transgenderism as the fix to all this rejection. As a transgender, she can fall in love with herself and avoid rejection. Yes, it is psychologically unhealthy behavior, but it will provide a temporary reprieve from the rejection she has experienced so far in her life.

Young people who consider themselves neglected, abused, or abandoned may turn to self-abusive or attention-getting behaviors. They latch on to anything they can control when all seems out of control. Notice I said “consider.” A child can feel rejected when no rejection exists. Perceived rejection can lead a child towards homosexuality or transgenderism because it looks more attractive than the life they have, or allows them to feel in control of their life.

Parents need to take a stand against public schools and government policies that are intended to groom children towards gender change and eliminating male and female sex distinctions. Parents cannot afford to stand silently by while their right to parent their children is eroded.

Walt Heyer is an accomplished author and public speaker with a passion for mentoring individuals whose lives have been torn apart by unnecessary gender-change surgery.

Jezebel is a spirit, but it finds access through uncrucified flesh. Although the Jezebel spirit is described in the Bible as being a woman, it does not actually have a gender. There is no doubt that it functions just as proficiently through men.

1. Refuses to admit guilt or wrong

A Jezebel spirit is never wrong, unless it is a temporary admittance of guilt to gain “favor” with someone. To accept responsibility would violate the core of insecurity and pride from which it operates. When a Jezebel apologizes it is never in true repentance or acknowledgment of wrongdoing but rather “I’m sorry your feelings were hurt.”

2. Takes credit for everything

While a strong trait of Jezebel is to never take responsibility for his wrong actions or behavior, he also is quick to take credit for benefits for which he contributed no effort.

“Cowards lie. Sheep lie dead. The moon rises, the sun sets. Woe be gone to all who fail to turn their faces to the Son. Darkness invades the spirit of many yet those who seek Light shall have eternal life.

Trust in the Lord your God for His kingdom shall reign forever. His Bright Shining Star will light the embers of the soul, bringing light into the darkness.

Repent ye who seek evil for evil will wither as winter leaves. Stand tall as oaks along a stream for the water of life feeds them. Repent all who carry false swords thinking your ways are right for your feet are planted in shifting sands and a breath shall destroy you.

Take heed all who cast their stones in shallow waters, who wade in creeks of dryness. Dry land desires rain and cracks with the age of time. Time, all sinners, is…

In Nashville, Tennessee, during the first week of January, 1996, more than 4,000 baseball coaches descended upon the Opryland Hotel for the 52nd annual ABCA convention.

While I waited in line to register with the hotel staff, I heard other more veteran coaches rumbling about the lineup of speakers scheduled to present during the weekend. One name, in particular, kept resurfacing, always with the same sentiment — “John Scolinos is here? Oh, man, worth every penny of my airfare.”

Who the hell is John Scolinos, I wondered. No matter, I was just happy to be there.

In 1996, Coach Scolinos was 78 years old and five years retired from a college coaching career that began in 1948. He shuffled to the stage to an impressive standing ovation, wearing dark polyester pants, a light blue shirt, and a string around his neck from which home plate hung — a full-sized, stark-white home plate.

Seriously, I wondered, who in the hell is this guy?

After speaking for twenty-five minutes, not once mentioning the prop hanging around his neck, Coach Scolinos appeared to notice the snickering among some of the coaches. Even those who knew Coach Scolinos had to wonder exactly where he was going with this, or if he had simply forgotten about home plate since he’d gotten on stage.Then, finally …“You’re probably all wondering why I’m wearing home plate around my neck. ,” he said, his voice growing irascible. I laughed along with the others, acknowledging the possibility. “I may be old, but I’m not crazy. The reason I stand before you today is to share with you baseball people what I’ve learned in my life, what I’ve learned about home plate in my 78 years.”Several hands went up when Scolinos asked how many Little League coaches were in the room. “Do you know how wide home plate is in Little League?”

After a pause, someone offered, “Seventeen inches?”, more of a question than answer.

“That’s right,” he said. “How about in Babe Ruth’s day? Any Babe Ruth coaches in the house?”Another long pause.

“Seventeen inches?” came a guess from another reluctant coach.

“That’s right,” said Scolinos. “Now, how many high school coaches do we have in the room?” Hundreds of hands shot up, as the pattern began to appear. “How wide is home plate in high school baseball?”

“Seventeen inches,” they said, sounding more confident.

“You’re right!” Scolinos barked. “And you college coaches, how wide is home plate in college?”

“Seventeen inches!” we said, in unison.

“Any Minor League coaches here? How wide is home plate in pro ball?”

“Seventeen inches!”

“RIGHT! And in the Major Leagues, how wide home plate is in the Major Leagues?”

“Seventeen inches!”

“SEV-EN-TEEN INCHES!” he confirmed, his voice bellowing off the walls. “And what do they do with a Big League pitcher who can’t throw the ball over seventeen inches?” Pause. “They send him to Pocatello !” he hollered, drawing raucous laughter. “What they don’t do is this: they don’t say, ‘Ah, that’s okay, Jimmy. You can’t hit a seventeen-inch target? We’ll make it eighteen inches, or nineteen inches. We’ll make it twenty inches so you have a better chance of hitting it. If you can’t hit that, let us know so we can make it wider still, say twenty-five inches.’”Pause.“Coaches …”Pause.” … what do we do when our best player shows up late to practice? When our team rules forbid facial hair and a guy shows up unshaven? What if he gets caught drinking? Do we hold him accountable? Or do we change the rules to fit him. Do we widen home plate? The chuckles gradually faded as four thousand coaches grew quiet, the fog lifting as the old coach’s message began to unfold. He turned the plate toward himself and, using a Sharpie, began to draw something. When he turned it toward the crowd, point up, a house was revealed, complete with a freshly drawn door and two windows. “This is the problem in our homes today. With our marriages, with the way we parent our kids. With our discipline. We don’t teach accountability to our kids, and there is no consequence for failing to meet standards. We widen the plate!”

Pause. Then, to the point at the top of the house he added a small American flag. “This is the problem in our schools today. The quality of our education is going downhill fast and teachers have been stripped of the tools they need to be successful, and to educate and discipline our young people. We are allowing others to widen home plate! Where is that getting us?”

Silence. He replaced the flag with a Cross. “And this is the problem in the Church, where powerful people in positions of authority have taken advantage of young children, only to have such an atrocity swept under the rug for years. Our church leaders are widening home plate for themselves! And we allow it.”

“And the same is true with our government. Our so called representatives make rules for us that don’t apply to themselves. They take bribes from lobbyists and foreign countries. They no longer serve us. And we allow them to widen home plate and we see our country falling into a dark abyss while we watch.”

I was amazed. At a baseball convention where I expected to learn something about curveballs and bunting and how to run better practices, I had learned something far more valuable. From an old man with home plate strung around his neck, I had learned something about life, about myself, about my own weaknesses and about my responsibilities as a leader. I had to hold myself and others accountable to that which I knew to be right, lest our families, our faith, and our society continue down an undesirable path.

“If I am lucky,” Coach Scolinos concluded, “you will remember one thing from this old coach today. It is this: if we fail to hold ourselves to a higher standard, a standard of what we know to be right; if we fail to hold our spouses and our children to the same standards, if we are unwilling or unable to provide a consequence when they do not meet the standard; and if our schools and churches and our government fail to hold themselves accountable to those they serve, there is but one thing to look forward to …” With that, he held home plate in front of his chest, turned it around, and revealed its dark black backside. “… dark days ahead.”

Coach Scolinos died in 2009 at the age of 91, but not before touching the lives of hundreds of players and coaches, including mine. Meeting him at my first ABCA convention kept me returning year after year, looking for similar wisdom and inspiration from other coaches. He is the best clinic speaker the ABCA has ever known because he was so much more than a baseball coach. His message was clear: “Coaches, keep your players—no matter how good they are—your own children, your churches, your government, and most of all, keep yourself at seventeen inches.